Abstract
Pantoea ananatis is a highly versatile enterobacterium isolated from diverse environmental sources. The ecological diversity of this species may be attributed, in part, to the acquisition of mobile genetic elements. One such element is an Integrative and Conjugative Element (ICE). By means of in silico analyses the ICE elements belonging to a novel family, ICEPan, were identified in the genome sequences of five P. ananatis strains and characterized. PCR screening showed that ICEPan is prevalent among P. ananatis strains isolated from different environmental sources and geographic locations. Members of the ICEPan family share a common origin with ICEs of other enterobacteria, as well as conjugative plasmids of Erwinia spp. Aside from core modules for ICEPan integration, maintenance and dissemination, the ICEPan contain extensive non-conserved islands coding for proteins that may contribute toward various phenotypes such as stress response and antibiosis, and the highly diverse ICEPan thus plays a major role in the diversification of P. ananatis. An island is furthermore integrated within an ICEPan DNA repair-encoding locus umuDC and we postulate its role in stress-induced dissemination and/or expression of the genes on this island.
Highlights
Pantoea ananatis is a ubiquitous and versatile enterobacterial species, with strains isolated globally from a wide range of environmental sources
These elements belong to a novel family, ICEPan, named in accordance with the nomenclatural system proposed by Burrus et al (2002), to reflect the species, P. ananatis in which they were identified, and the strain numbers to distinguish between the different ICEPan elements
While four of the ICEPan elements were integrated in one tRNA-Phe site (Site 1; adjacent to yjdC encoding a putative HTH-transcriptional regulator), the ICEPanAJ13355 was integrated within the second identical tRNA-Phe gene copy (Site 2; adjacent to serine phosphatase gene rbsU)
Summary
Pantoea ananatis is a ubiquitous and versatile enterobacterial species, with strains isolated globally from a wide range of environmental sources. Most commonly isolated from plants, P. ananatis has been identified as the causative agent of diseases on a wide range of host plants, including agronomically important crops such as rice, corn, onion, and Eucalyptus (Coutinho and Venter, 2009). Other isolates represent non-pathogenic endo- or epiphytes, while a plant growth promoting P. ananatis strain has recently been characterized and patented (Coutinho and Venter, 2009; Kim et al, 2012). The wide ecological distribution and versatile lifestyles of P. ananatis suggests that this bacterial species has undergone extensive genetic adaptation in order to effectively occupy and exploit its various ecological niches
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